1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to engineering change management and, more particularly, to a method and apparatus for engineering change management.
2. Description of the Related Art
Engineering Change Management (ECM) allows a fast, effective and secure way of dealing with engineering change processes. Various meta-objects can be used for the management and control of the engineering change process. A change notification object can be used by a customer, for example, to report issues to a company via the web. The company can then use the change notification to check further into the issue and decide if any follow-up activities are required on its part. If it is decided that an engineering change may be needed, the feasibility and necessity of the change can then be determined by one or more parties in the company. If it is determined that the changes are feasible and necessary, an approval process is started. If everyone involved in the approval process approves the changes, the changes can then be made.
FIGS. 2A and 2B are a flow chart and a block diagram for describing in more detail, an example of the engineering change process. A customer 20 may be, for example, external partners or internal colleagues to business 21. Customer 20 is capable of communicating with business 21 using various types of communication systems including, for example, the World Wide Web. When customer 20 wants to report an issue with, for example, a product manufactured by business 21, customer 20 prepares and sends a change notification to business 21 via, for example, the World Wide Web (Step S2). The change notification then gets routed to configuration management 22. Although shown in one box as entities of business 21, configuration management 22 and/or engineering 24 may be separate companies or entities from business 21 that partner with each other.
Configuration management 22 reviews the change notifications, creates an engineering change request (ECR) and assigns objects that need to be changed (Step S4). For example, objects that need to be changed may include manuals, schematics, bills of material, etc. The ECR is then routed to designated parties in engineering 24 where the feasibility of the changes for the affected objects is checked (Step S6). If configuration management 22 is notified by engineering 24 that some or all of the changes are feasible, configuration management 22 approves the ECR and converts it into an engineering change order (ECO) (Step S8). The ECO is then routed to engineering 24 where the objects can be changed in accordance with the ECO (Step S10).
During the engineering change process, different parties with different roles are involved at different stages of the process. For example, different parties may be responsible and/or accountable for various stages of the process. In addition, parties may need to be consulted and/or kept informed about various stages of the process. Accordingly, different types of notifications may be made available at different stages of the process in order to trigger required actions or simply to keep people informed.
During the engineering process, users can generate and send notifications to inform responsible, consulted and/or informed users of the status of the process. The notification is a way of sending short information messages to other users. Notifications can be sent manually or automatically. In present systems, when a user wants to send a manual notification to another user, the user enters details of the notification (e.g., subject, priority and comment, etc.) each time they want to send the notification. The system can also be arranged to send automatic notifications where the text is fixed, except for the link that gives access to the object on which the notification is based.
There is a need for a notification system that is flexible in the information that can be entered and yet is easy and efficient to use.